Eagledad

The next few weeks will be interesting. Our area (probably state) is almost back to normal. Little League Baseball at the nearby park is in full swing and businesses are almost back to normal. I don't know what Council is doing yet, but I can't see why meetings would be discouraged. Barry

Sorry. Wife also calls me on my expectation of reading my mind.

No need to delete. The references could be useful in the future. Barry

You are missing the point. There is no silver bullet for the BSA. Barry

I saw another anti-tobacco commercial last night. The anti tobacco lobby in the 70's and 80's made a lot of lawyers very rich by getting huge awards from the tobacco companies. As a result of that effort, smoking today in the USA is deemed so unacceptable (evil?), smokers are viewed as a lower class or damaged in character. So, why is there still so much anti-tobacco marketing? Barry

Yes, but it always was in the context of a SM, or role model. Boys were getting together and having fun long before Badon Powell started the program. The problem was the kind of fun they were having was not developing a better person. In fact, their fun was developing the wrong kind of character. BP started a program where the activities developed growth. The difference between the UK and the BSA was the BSA got more specific on the vision. But, not out of context with Badon Powell. BDs comments to Scoutmasters were always directed to giving scouts responsibility for making personal decisions that would develop growth in character and actions towards others. The reason, the only reason that Scouting exist today is because of the oath and law corner stone principles that hold the vision together. Without the Oath and Law, scouting would have fallen apart years ago because all games must have purpose if they are to survive the judge of time. Vision is an anchor that maintains success. The Oath and Law are the principles of the vision. If you want to discuss how scouting today has lost the soul of outdoors program, you will get lots of thumbs up. But to suggest the program isn't more than kids going camping, well I disagree. Barry

Sorry, I disagree. Scouting started as an adult program to develop growth in youth through the method of outdoors. The Vision and Mission support the goal. You may not like it because you want to be just for kids, but that is the reality. Barry

Units don't necessarily recharter at the same time. Because units use to recharter when they were created, that was their recharter date. Very very confusing. I've seen the districts organize the same month for rechartering, but I don't think National has. Of course, I've been out if that part of scouting for a while. . Barry

Looking back, our troop was successful on this part and I will give credit to "(Eagle is not supposed to be 'got', it is supposed to be earned)". Our program focused on the scout journey because we learned that each scout's individual vision is each scouts individual vision. And as a result, our program developed a reputation for boy run, fun, and adventure. Our troop averaged a new Eagle every 2.5 month at the average age of 16. That was the result of a fun program of adventure with a focus on Patrol Method, Not a focus on Eagle. The Eagle was just a by product of having fun. Usually 90% of our older scouts attended summer camp until they aged out. I used summer camp as point because older scouts don't in general like to repeat summer camp over and over. And, I know that "aged out" could suggest not continuing into to adult leadership, but it was a term of bragging for us because 95% of our Eagles were active youth in our troop until age 18. I think the BSA can try and make a go of it as some kind of outdoors program. But what made scouting a noble program was it's values (character). I don't feel the present management doesn't has the will to include values as even an equal benefit to outdoors, much less as the main objective. I heard the BSA Mission and Vision were recently changed. I will have to check that out. Still, I think there is some debate of what drove the long success of the program, values or adventure. For our program Values drove us to build a program of adventure that all the scouts would not only enjoy participating, but but growing as well. Barry

In 1993, I was introduced by a friend to her friend, the regional gay activist. In a brief discussion about the BSA, he said they were taking down the organization because of it's moral ideals that are contrary to the modern culture. I thought the guy was nuts at the time. Now, I understand. I feel sorry for the future families who will miss out on the scouting program that my dad, my sons and I got to experience. While is was a values program, it didn't have any foothold in the political nature. Activism has changed that. I'm feeling especially sorry for the more liberal families that would enjoy even today's program because I can see that Scouting is becoming more projected as a conservative program. In this political climate, I'm am not sure that scouting can ever appeal as a non political program ever again. Barry

So true. The mother of a 14 year old scout told me that her 17 year old son went on a high school field outing and the forecast was lots of rain. The 17 year old went and asked the 14 year old how to dress for the outing. The 14 year old couldn't figure out the big deal. National may now be forced to do that very thing. I might be interested in getting my grandkids into that program. Barry

That may be more profound that we realize. Our troop started out with heavy patrol boxes that required four scouts to carry from the trailer to the campsite. When we decided to become a dedicated backpacking troop (meaning carry all gear into camp with personal packs), we decided to make the switch over 6 month period. We thought the scouts would have a hard time getting away from the patrol boxes. Boy were we wrong. None of the six patrols took a patrol box ever again after the decision was made. We became an instant back packing troop, well except for the adults. Patrol Boxes were "work" in just about every aspect of the word. Camping out of the back pack was fun because it was basic. Patrols liked backpacking so long as they were moving to new camps. But, the dreaded hiking without gear (5 mile hike) or coming back to the same camp with gear as we often did for shake downs was not considered fun. Camping is fun if it isn't work. But only the scouts could define what is and isn't work. Barry

I agree. I polled our older scouts (14 and older) at the height of our troop program as to why they liked our troop, less than 25% said it was for the activities side of the program. First on their list was hanging out with their friends. I believe there was more to that because what would make our program more attractive than other Troops if it were really only about hanging out with friends. At the time, we had more age 14 and older scouts than any other troop or Venturing program unit in the council. But that is still a pretty awakening statistic. Barry

Sadly, this is basically the model of the majority troops. I call them 1st Class troops because they do is 1st Class requirements type of program. The older scouts get bored because after surviving 3 years of following a 1st class type program, they are expected to repeat their experience as the leaders of the same program designed for the younger scouts. It's is what many adults call a babysitting program. Ironically, it's the program they made and support, but don't understand how limits scout maturity. A troop that focuses on activities that challenges all levels of maturity and experiences are the programs where older scouts enjoy mentoring younger scouts while still enjoying challenging mature activities. Barry

This used to be the expectation of Explorers before it was pushed as Troop older scout program. I know my scuba Explorers was very much a higher maturity experience. I grew up a lot in that program. I think what has to change is first get rid of the Troop Venture Patrol program and then bring back Explorers in the context of specific sponsors who associate to the specific theme like Law Enforcement, Rescue, Emergency care, Aviation and so forth. Leave the general outdoor adventure activities like backpacking and canoeing to the Venturing program for troop programs. Barry

I kind of like that idea. A large group of adults (50/50 men and women) become scouters for their own personal adventure. Right or wrong, there are A LOT of them. Wood Badge was a natural temptation for these adults because it was an adult oriented honor society that doesn't fit with the unit level volunteerism. But, as a volunteer corp with the prestige of outdoors expertise with the actions of selfless noble service, it might have an attraction for adults that would keep them out of the scouts way. Hmm, thinking, thinking. Barry

Hmm, Actually my comments were more towards the older scouts attitude of babysitting, but I do also believe advancement or Eagle heavy programs also drive a lot of older scouts out. I found that most Eagle heavy type programs have an average older scout age of 14. Now I can't say how girl troops fit with my observations of boys, there are a lot of unknown variables there including that girls are different than boys. But I can say that less than 5 percent of the scouts in my troop were specifically in it for the Eagle. And, if the Eagle was the primary motivation, they eventually left for another troop. That being said, we averaged one Eagle every 2.5 months. You might find it interesting that 3 out of 4 new Venturing Crews are started by Troop leaders who need a program to keep their older scouts. AND, 3 out of 5 of Venturing crews close up shop just after 3.5 years. The crews that last the longest typically have no affiliation with a troop. Crews affiliated with troops that are successful typically require the Venturing age scouts stay involved at the troop level. That included the Venturing girls even before girls were accepted into troops. That Scouts stay in the programs mainly for the fun is really a myth. Scouts typically stay in their unit because of the way program they feel about themselves as a scout. Sure, the fun factor has a lot of drive in the beginning, but let's face it, after 30 camp outs, can number 31 really be the driver to come to next weeks meeting. The feeling of how they like themselves in the troop typically comes from the accomplishments of responsibility (character growth), not adventure or advancement. Responsibility in the troop typically includes some aspect of role modeling to other scouts. Camping and advancement are just tools for building character, they are not the goals of the program. Barry

My apologies, I wasn't trying to be personal, I meant to talk in generalities for the many different readers of the posts. Ah! You just made it personal. And I can say with confidence that any unit where babysitting is a word to describe their program, THEY ARE DOING IT WRONG. And please, I'm not saying I know your program, but I worked with a lot of units where they started with this attitude and I helped them to see where the program needed to change. Babysitting is an attitude generated by adults, not youth. Every unit has the same basic parents, so how do some units get past a program where they believe older scouts don't want to hang around younger scouts because the All Mighty Eagle is the main thing. Well, in short, the adult leaders learn focus less on scout out comes and more on turning responsibility into fun actions for all the scouts. We older scouters call it, youth run and patrol method. Knowledge and expertise often appears as arrogance to those with limited experience. Where the two meet is through humility. You can trust that I don't usually show such confidence in areas of scouting where I have limited experience, such as managing a Venturing unit. But I have a great deal of knowledge in how scouts of the troop are motivated and discouraged in the troop program. My knowledge wasn't developed just from my successes, but my many failures as well. So, while the program moves forward (forward?) from today's challenges, I will still be here to posts on the bigger picture of building leaders of integrity and citizens of character. Because that goal doesn't change with time. Barry

Who is babysitting who! Doesn't matter, if babysitting is a word being used in your unit, they they are doing it wrong. And why would girls leave venturing for troops? If the boys are leaving because of babysitting, what is the attraction for girls? The unit leaders are doing it wrong. Chuckhardt has never hid his Troop's purpose of earning Eagles, but I know from experience that once the shininess of the Eagle wears off, the program better have something else. That something else is where the BSA will live or die in the future. Our troop when I was an active leader had the largest group of scouts 14 and older in the council. We were approached several times by council to start a Venturing Crew, but that didn't make sense to us. If our troop was so successful without venturing, why risk dividing up the program. Our formula for success was adventure. Besides our fun monthly camp outs, our troop averaged 6 High Adventure Outtings a year. And there were no age requirements or limitations. If an 11 year old was mentally and physically capable, they were welcome to the crew. That's not to say we didn't have Eagles, our troop averaged an Eagle every 2.5 months. But advancement was the scout's responsibility. The secret to our scouts earning Eagles was keeping them around until they were 18. The average age our scouts passed their EBOR was 16.5 years old. If a scout hangs around long enough, they trip over the Eagle. We had a program were scouts wanted to come and hang out. It was program where young adults were respected as young adults and they like that.

It might be good press, but it also shows how Boy Scouts is viewed more as a youth after school program instead of a Community Service organization. We saw the same thing here in Oklahoma City recently after a tornado tore up the south part of town. Our council, which is accustom to organizing assistance was told to stay out by FEMA. I'm told it's a litigation issue. Scouts are still allowed to help in smaller towns, but it's a challenge in the bigger city. There are still ways the scouts can help, but it wasn't that long ago that we were considered an integral part in the community disaster relief. Beary

Goodness I've tried. I brought up discussions in my leaders courses and even created a council leaders course specifically on the subject of giving scouts the trust to screw up because they develop character from the decisions. A couple of adults come back and tell me stories of how they changed their program from the course, but in general I found the loud crickets in the background. I believe our parental instinct to protect our kids is greater than the wisdom of letting youth learn by their own efforts. The reason that scouting carries on with adults who have a youth scouting experience isn't so much those adults value the growth from making independent decisions, they are simply doing the easy thing of continuing the scouting experience of their youth. That certainly was the case for me. I do believe if National took and interest of showing the relationship between giving scouts independence to make decisions and the resulting growth, more adults would take interest. But, in these times of adding more adult participation for youth protection, I don't see that happening. In fact, the membership changes over last few years are bringing in even more adults without a youth scouting experience, which is making the problem more complex. Eventually this program will become saturated enough with adults who have a youth scouting experience to carry tradition forward, but what kind of program did they experience. I'm confident it won't be much like the traditional program that my dad, me and my son's experienced. Is it a program that my son's will want for my grand kids? Barry

Something has to be said, the challenge is who is going to say it. Barry

I came from the 70's so I didn't see the effects of the changes. For me, the first obvious sign of the end was the creation of the New Scout Patrols. What appears small created a ripple effect that forced adults to become more intrusive in just about all the personal decisions scouts made in planning their activities. The intrusiveness was doubled down with the implementation of the First Class in First Year program. Equally, if not greater, to the negative program effects from the New Scout Patrols was the unforeseen effects of a degrading Patrol Method concept after National changed the adult membership to include female troop leaders. The program killer had nothing do with gender, but instead the issue was experience. Or more directly, lack of a youth scouting experience. The massive influx of inexperienced adults forced incomprehension into a program that at that time relied heavily on adult leaders with a youth scouting experience. Even National was shocked at the sudden trend away from a boy lead program. They attempted to bring some balance with all new training syllabuses in 2000, but evidence shows that nothing replaces experience for continuing the concept of giving youth independence for making bad decisions with the intention of developing good character? Barry

Eagle94 says it so eloquently, if the adults insure scouts learn and experience the skills, those adults will watch their scouts grow to be the best kind of scouts. Instead of taking responsibility for the scouts ranks, take responsibility for scouts developing their skills of self-independence and ethical decision making. Take pride in watching them grow into responsible citizens, or as I like to say, citizens of character and leaders of integrity. I admit that not taking responsibility for each of scout's personal choices in the program was a challenge that I had to practice everyday. We all have a vision in our head of the ideal boy scout and temptation tends to steer us toward pushing scouts that direction. But in reality, the program is intended for each scout to make decisions for his dream of being a scout. In that bigger vision of building adults who use the scout oath and law to make moral and ethical decisions, we find that advancement is a small by product of the scouts personal experiences in their lives, not ours. But, I found that when I focused more to enhancing their experiences by pushing a fun adventurous program, the scouts eventually found more ambition toward ranks. Getting adults to look at the troop program as a resource for the scout's personal vision of their experience is challenging, and maybe one way to start in that direction is ask the adults to think of ways to enhance the other 7 Methods so as to trust that the scout will eventually include advancement in their vision. If the program becomes more exciting by supercharging Patrol Method and Camping, the scouts focus more energy in the troop program over other outside activities because not only is the troop fun, it's gives the scout some self-satisfaction from the accomplishments of the program challenges. I've seen it work exactly like that, but developing that kind of program is even more challenging for the adults because they have to be creative enough to provide that kind of program without getting in the way of the scouts running the program. It's a test and practice of the Adult Association Method within the context of a Scout run patrol method program. Adult Method in that context is hard and requires humility and practice. Sorry, this went way off, but I found Eagle94's post exciting and wanted to support him. Barry

Thanks all, good discussion. I think of Aims and Methods as instruction or a map for scouters. You basically said the same with, "The methods are how we achieve the aims. This creates a very simple litmus test for us.". The goal of building ethical and moral decision makers is a broad idealistic vision. Aims and Methods is the instructional path. I have always felt the Methods are the scouts' responsibilities'. And the Aims are the Adults responsibilities. Yep, good post. EXACTLY! This is how I taught all adults to try and think about working with scouts. If a scout's action or activity doesn't work toward the Aims, I found myself dropping it out of the program. And, if that action or activity does work toward the Aims, how can we enhance it to be even more productive toward growth? Also, once the adult starts thinking about how Methods work toward Aims. for example Uniform, they can explain it's value more clearly to anyone in simple terms and justify their program. Explaining the program in simple terms became very important when I was teaching Scoutmaster Fundamentals. Everything scouting comes up with new adult volunteers. Like Uniform. It's more than just looking sharp right? I've mentioned that Uniform for me was more than just wearing the uniform, but what values does just wearing the uniform do for a scout. We start with making the right or wrong decision to wear the uniform properly. Just the decision of how to wear the uniform starts a scout off in the right or wrong direction of making good decisions. What else? The Uniform starts every scout equal by looking the same in the context of Scouting by not segregating the rich from the poor or educated from the less educated. On the other hand, the uniform give the scout individuality within the context of scouting with badges that identify a scouts rank, patrol, troop and district. The scout may be a member of OA and have advanced training. A scout can truly set them-self apart in uniformity simply by wearing a uniform. Leadership is hard for adults to get their heads around. Leadership has always been marketed as a goal of scouting, but most adults can't really define growth in leadership except for the documented Positions of Responsibility. Still, leadership was so values as a trait of scouting that the Army specifically looked for Boy Scouts for the invasion Normandy because the planners knew that so many soldiers would be injured of killed that they needed soldiers who could quickly step up. Is stepping up really a leadership trait? Well let's see. We struggle today with leadership development because most of the adult volunteers today's don't have any scouting experience to set the expectation. In the past, most adult leaders where scouts themselves. So without thought, patrols had hierarchies of more experienced guiding the less experienced and more ambitious setting a different path than less ambitious. Leadership was more about role models using servant direction to build a functional performing patrol during scouting activities. The patrol as a whole or team took more responsibility building experienced skilled scouts out of all their members. For most scouts, rank was a byproduct of how well the patrol used skills during their activities. Patrol guidance, training, coaching were learned by the young scouts from the role model older scouts. Not in classes, but in the actions of patrol activities. Outside leadership training wasn't required because skills were learned and experienced in the patrol and handed over from generation to generation. Those skills continued into the adult ranks, so leadership wasn't really a thing, it was a part of the whole thing of being a scout. But, adults today struggle to push a patrol to become an independent functional performing team unit. Without seeing for themselves, parents just plain lack the trust of youth. The adults tend to drive activities that make sense to them, like advancement. I even struggled in my own troop to push First-aid month to be about skills, not advancement. Plan a fun month of first-aid development, and let the scout find someone to sigh off requirements, if he desires. Scouts struggle with leadership development today because the adults themselves don't know how to define leadership development in the Patrol Method world. Adults get hung up on elections for leadership, but elections have nothing to do with leadership development. I taught and pushed the idea that if the adult believes training is required for leadership development, then they don't know how to do leadership development. I honestly don't know if leadership development can be fixed because the ratio of non experienced scouters is increasing. Exactly. Both my sons had no aspirations of being leaders, yet they were well respected, and called leaders, because of the areas they loved doing. I taught that scouting is all about developing confidence in making the next step. Whether it be camping skills or working with others, confidence comes off as leadership because it takes on the dark unknown challenges in stride. Confidence makes us "can do" type people, and "can-do" people are pro-actionary, which has the appearance of leadership. Confidence takes what a person knows and applies it to what they don't know to plan the next step forward. When the planners of the invasion wanted Boy Scouts, they were really wanting soldiers with confidence to move forward even when confronted with unspeakable challenges of battle. They saw confidence as leadership. And they believe that leadership (confidence) came from the experience of scouting. I agree that Fun seems to be a harder challenge in scouting, and I believe it goes back to inexperienced adults. They don't have the experience of why standing by a simple campfire can be fun. A hike or fishing or building a fire. All of a sudden, these are activities of advancing, because as I said, advancing is a simple methodical method of pushing a scouting program. A new SM called me once to ask for program ideas because his scouts had run out of activities for campouts. He had mentioned that their themes were advancement driven. I suggested one to two hours of free time before dinner. He was aghast. "FREE TIME. I can imagine the trouble they will get into". He couldn't consider that scout created fun should be part of the program. he was never a scout himself. I have personally experienced the challenge of turning adults leaders minds to building a fun activity and letting the scout figure out if they want to use that experience in their advancement quest. I had a meeting at my house one year to organize a summer camp team for getting our troop of 100 scouts to summer camp. One mother stepped up to lead the group because she was angry that her son didn't advance at camp the previous year. Her 11 year old son had so much fun with all the camp activities that getting requirements signed off just wasn't on his mind. She had a plan to advance every scout this next summer. I spent the next 30 minutes of explaining why her son did it right because he had fun. Her son Eagled 3 years later when other proprieties became important. My comments appear to be anti-advancement, but they are not. My concern is how the adult side is loosing the understanding of A Game with a Purpose. For me, if we let the scout's take responsibility for the Methods, then the adults can focus on the performance of the Aims. The only real advice scouts need with Methods is to use them. Don't leave any out. On the other hand, if the adults don't see growth in character, citizenship, fitness, and leadership (confidence), then they should evaluate the program and make changes. I believe the adults in a high performing program are always making changes. Always tweaking and polishing. Nothing stays the same because different personalities of patrols rotate through the program. As a result, the program requires changed to fit the individuality of application of methods. More camping, less camping? More Patrol Method, less patrol Method? Uniform? leadership, is there any? On and on. Fun and growth, fun and growth, fun and growth. And not that the scouts shouldn't be included in those decisions. They must be part of the team. One year I approached the PLC for a change I felt would improve our program. I found the better performing troops tend to elect SPLs for 1 year terms. Seems that 6 months is just enough time to figure out how to lead a troop but not use the experience to benefit it. So, I proposed we give 1 year SPL elections a test. I was clearly voted down by the PLC. Oh well, it was their loss. LOL. Good discussion, I hope we get more on the makings of Aims and Methods. Barry